An interesting compromise device. Slightly surprised with the specs of the device though - I would have thought a 720p display and something at least equivalent to the Galaxy Camera in terms of SoC.

It is not for me personally, but I can see this appealing to quite a few users who are hankering after an always available, good quality camera with Xenon alongside a reasonably decent Android phone.Reply

I was also thinking with better hardware (and the ability to shoot in raw format, lol), I could be enticed by such a smartphone. I'm always glad to see phone makers experiment with designs outside of the iPhone mold.Reply

I would have kept the Galaxy Camera name for this... It's a Galaxy Camera that can make calls. Which isn't so bad I guess..

I can sort of see the use case. It's a niche product. I don't know many people who need their pics to be uploaded to FB within 2 seconds. The example Anand gave was wedding photos.. OK.

But for a normal person.. all my stuff is on my real phone anyway.. I'd rather carry my S4 and P&S separately instead of carrying this monstrosity. If I am in a super hurry to upload pictures, I can still put the microSD card from the camera into the phone, or just use USB OTG to connect them.

Samsung, the day you will truly kill P&S is if you release a normal S4 with an attachable lens, which you could sell for $100+.Reply

I would have been very happy if Samsung had modified a regular GS4 with a camera similar to the one in the Nokia 808 Pureview. It would have been a great smartphone with advanced optics that could still fit comfortably in your pants.

Instead, they merged a GS4 Mini with a mediocre point and shoot. The lens is too slow for good night shots, which is the whole reason I drag a PnS along to bars and parties. It is also oddly shaped (at least my old TL110 had a tapered collar around the lens), which means it isn't going to slide into my pocket or sit on a car cradle well. And being a derivative of a derivative, I'd bet that software updates from the carriers will dry up quickly.

Nokia needs to hurry up and end their partnership with Microsoft so that we can finally get some nice CAMERAphones with Android.Reply

Yep. That sentence refers to the previous generation Samsung Galaxy Camera. The person above you is talking about the Samsung Galaxy S4 Zoom which has all the functionalities of an Andriod smartphone. Reply

I agree with others... It's an average to mediocre phone and and an average to mediocre point and shoot... But I imagine it'll still have a fairly healthy mass market appeal if it's priced right (<$350, particularly if it's on contact), it's just not anything special for typical enthusiast. Bumped down phone specs (SoC/display) and a brick-ish form factor (compared to modern phones) with a protruding ring on the back would give me pause even if it were better spec'd.

A slightly shorter but brighter zoom might've made it a viable alternative to the kind of advanced compacts that enthusiasts tend to carry for better low light photos, and it's probably more viable than a larger sensor... Something along the lines of the 5-7x lenses on the Canon S100/S110 & Panasonic DMC-LF1, which start at f/2.0 (most low light photos are taken at the wide end anyway). I understand a 10x zoom is probably an easier upsell to the average Joe tho, sadly.

All that aside, my biggest worry would be sharing battery life between the camera and the phone... If it doesn't have a larger battery than a Moto MAXX it's gonna be a big fail regardless of the intended user... They conveniently left price and battery capacity out of the announcement. It's definitely gonna be somewhat less rugged than the average phone too, fumble it and now you risk a broken screen plus a broken lens or lens retract mechanism. Hopefully they had the foresight to build in a wrist strap mount!Reply

What's with Samsung and using such small sensors, for phones that look like point and shoots? I'd rather they would've made it this thick with a 4/3" sensor, and use pixel-binning, than to add a "10x zoom" to a 1/2.3" sensor.Reply